System Wars: Here Comes the Heroes!-Chapter 20: From a duel, to a Three vs. One

*Bachunk!*

"Oh hey, power's back on...by the way, as much as I find it oddly comfortable to be dipped like this, could you stand me up, please?"

"Of course, my liege."

SK was feeling rather good about this victory that he and Platiknight had managed to achieve tonight.

The two of them had managed to defeat a dangerous foe by working together like proper allies and would soon be rewarded for their act of justice.

After all, it would be really fucked up if the System didn't recognize the fact that they had put a stop to the dastardly deeds of a fake fortuneteller.

Therefore, once he was back on his feet, he was fully ready for the reward screen messages and to go back and just--

[Emergency Quest has been activated.]

"Say what?"

[Emergency Quest: Fight for your life has been activated.]

"Oh shit."

[Description: Sometimes in life, you end up fighting foes who just won't take their defeat gracefully, necessitating a full-on beatdown.]

[Objective: Defeat enemy Familiars (0/3)]

[Reward: Moment Appropriate Skill Crystal, One Random Skill Crystal, Financial compensation for the therapy sessions that are sure to follow.]

[Penalty: None, because they're going to kill you.]

"Wait a minute, shouldn't that counter be reading one of-"

"AWOOOO!"

"Damnit."

Mortis the Barghest leaped out of a bush that was directly adjacent to the building he just impacted, as evident by the bloodstain on the brickwork directly behind the aforesaid foliage.

A vicious glint of a hate-filled grudge burned behind his crimson eyes, but the battered beast didn't attack just yet.

Instead, he patiently stood there in an attack position as he was joined by his two other companions.

"Skreeee!"

"Hahah! Looks like we're having a real party now!"

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Descending from above, a squat yellow goblin creature came flying in while holding on to the claws of a strange demonic owl.

The duo, however, did not flock to Mortis's side.

Instead, the yellow goblin creatures jumped off of the demon owl's claws, turned into a bolt of lightning, struck one of the streetlights, temporarily merged with it, and then manifested right on top of the bulb.

As for the demonic owl, it simply landed on top of a car that was equidistant from the goblin and the barghest.

"My liege..."

"I know, Platiknight. I know."

SK and Platiknight were now totally surrounded.

"Man, you must've pissed off the boss something fierce if you got her to pull out all the stops to summon all of us at once," the yellow goblin creature declared to SK and Platiknight.

"Of course they have someone that can talk," SK groaned. "Great..."

A small part of SK hoped in this moment that this goblin creature wasn't as verbose as it's master. Unfortunately, the little yellow shitstain of a monster was equally verbose.

"Now, we know who you are and you know who Mortis is, so I'm going to just introduce myself and my feathered friend here," the goblin continued, ignoring SK's obvious display of annoyance. "I am Gamble the Gremlin, and she is Fletcher the Strix."

In response to her name being shared, Fletcher released a low gargling sound that sounded like the equivalent of shoving a rat down a garbage disposal.

"I thought owls were supposed to go 'hoot-hoot'," SK commented with obvious fear and disgust in voice at the sound of this demon owl's demented cry.

"Anyways," Gamble continued, "our usual responsibility pertains to us causing misfortune for others. But tonight, and tonight only, we're going to be doing something special and ripping you and the action over there into tiny little pieces! Don't take it personal; we're just following orders. Now, die! Malfunction Bolt!"

Before either of his two companions could rush in to attack, Gamble made the opening move by raising a clawed hand into the air and summoning a ball of lightning inside of it. Once it had fully formed, the lighting ball began to siphon power from several cars and street lamps in the area before being thrown by Gamble directly towards Platiknight and SK.

"Oh balls!" SK cursed.

"I got it!" Platiknight assured SK. "Platinum Counter!"

...

'My liege, when I counter the attack, I need you to drop to the ground and immediately roll backwards and get into your apartment.'

'What? Why?'

'Just trust me.'

...

Before the lighting ball could make contact, Platiknight channeled energy into his shield and smacked the lighting ball right back at Gamble with nearly double the force than what was launched at him.

"Whoa!"

Unfortunately, Platiknight's counter had missed due to Gamble realizing the danger and dropping down from his perch on the street lamp to start dangling from it instead like a monkey on a tree branch.

"What are you mugs standing around for?!" Gamble shouted. "Get him!"

"RUFF!"

"SKREE!"

Heeding Gamble's call to action, Fletcher and Mortis rushed in to attack Platiknight, with the former going high and the latter going low.

"WOOF!"

"Foul hound! Begone! Platinum Shield Smash!"

Bam!

"Whine!"

Mortis was the first to attack Platiknight, lunging at the armored superhero in an attempt to bite down on his shiny metal neck. Unfortunately, Platiknight was still faster than he was, so Mortis got nothing but a shield smash to the jaw for his troubles.

"SKREE!"

"Huh? Bah!"

On the flip side, this attack also left Platiknight open for a follow-up attack from Fletcher.

The strix had purposely hung back so that it could get a clear shot at slashing at Platiknight's exposed back when the knight attacked Mortis.

"That's the ticket! My turn!" Gamble shouted as he climbed back on top of the street lamp. "Spark Spark Barrage!"

Gamble proceeded to drain even more electricity in the area before condensing the power into his grubby little claws and directing it towards Platiknight's direction.

Bolts of electricity began to fall on Platiknight like arrows one after the other, forcing the precious metal paragon to direct his shield against it.

Under ideal circumstances, Platiknight could've tanked these attacks until Gamble ran out of electricity.

However, these were less than ideal circumstances.

"Foul cretin! How dare you-"

"WOOF!"

"SKREE!"

"-ah!"

With the shield directed towards the lighting barrage, this left Platiknight's back wide open to Mortis and Fletcher, who took that opportunity to strike.

Long, obvious but shallow scratches formed on Platiknight's armor after this second assault, which did wonders to boost the morale of the monsters. After all, this was an obvious sign that their attacks were working.

All they needed was a little more time and focus.

Unfortunately, this focus came at a cost.

If they had just taken the time to pivot their gazes elsewhere, they would've noticed that SK was no longer on the immediate battlefield.

In fact, they probably would've noticed that when Platiknight countered Gamble's opening salvo, SK had dropped and roll in order to sneak into his apartment at Platiknight's instructions.

As for the reason why he did so, well...he wasn't event sure himself.

...Switching POV...

"Alright," SK began to think aloud as he snuck into his apartment and closed the door behind him. "Why the fuck did Platiknight tell me to get back to my apartment?"

A part of SK had assumed Platiknight had told him to sneak away so that he could get out of the line of fire, which made sense but also seemed out of character.

Platiknight was made to be the bold defender, with the complete confidence to defend the innocent regardless of the situation.

"There has to be another reason why I got asked to...hold up."

In the exact moment SK was about to ask himself as to why he was up here, his eyes landed on the computer desktop and tablet he used whenever he drew his comics and designed his superheroes.

"Oh. OH!"

Once it had mentally clicked, SK summoned the System interface, sped through the menu items until he got to the inventory screen, and rapidly jammed his hand into that floating blue screen of hope.

"Gah! Tingles!"

After he extracted his hand from the inventory, he saw that he was now holding a shiny golden ticket.

"Alright, you ill omens. You motherfuckers wanna make this into a numbers game?" SK cursed as he mentally prepared himself to tear the golden ticket in two. "Then game on!"

CHHHRIP!

As soon as SK tore the ticket in two, he could feel the energy from the ticket cause the world around him to slow down...

..Meanwhile...

"Ring! Ring!" *ka-chak* "911, what's your emergency?"

"Hi, I think there's something bad going on at my neighbor's building."

"Okay, can you please elaborate on that? Is this medical related, law enforcement, or a fire emergency?"

"The power for their block just went down out of nowhere while the rest of the area is completely fine, and I think I either heard something loud like a-"

BANG!

"THAT!"

"Understood ma'am. We'll be sending over a police car to check out the disturbance. Have a lovely rest of your evening."